Who We Are?
Hello, I am Tony Ripper - may I extend a warm welcome to our website. Along with Josie Clark, we founded The Cruise Advisory Service in 1989. Back then, cruising was in its infancy, but growing. However, there was very much a lack of impartial information and guidance about the cruise ships and how they operated. At that point, I already had nearly 20 years in  the travel industry with Thomas Cook, American Express and Wakefield Fortune. With the latter I had the task of leading a 'hotel inspection team', publishing our reports on 100's of package resort hotels. This was designed to 'strip away the gloss' of holiday brochures and tell it like it is. Some 34 years ago, Josie and I brought this same way of working to cruiseships, telling clients the good bits and the not-so-good bits. The same way of working still holds true today and some straight talking, bundles of knowledge and decent honest service still go a long way

As well as looking after our clients cruise holiday bookings, we also offer the following information packs and publications -

 

CoastlInes Email Newsletter 
For our clients looking to cruise in the midrange and premium ocean and river cruise market, we publish our CoastLines Email Newsletter every 2 weeks throughout the year. The newsletter brings you the latest news and gossip, tells you what we have been up to and includes the latest offers from Silversea. Regent Seven Seas Cruises, Azamara Cruises, Oceania, Celebrity Cruises, Holland America Line, Seabourn plus our river cruise partners

​

​

Alaska and Canada
For the past 30 years or so, we have been one of the UK's market leaders in cruising to Alaska. Every May we publish our Alaska and Canada Information Pack featuring Holland America Line, Celebrity Cruises,
Regent Seven Seas Cruises, Silversea and others, together with the Rocky Mountaineer, Denali Alaska landtours, Vancouver and Rockies hotel stays and much more. We also publish reports on each port of call telling what to do and what not to bother with. We know Alaska, we know the ships and we know the in's and out's

 

​

 

The Ocean Cruiseship Ratings Guide

Every year for the past  three decades have published our Ocean Cruiseship Ratings Guide. The current guide features 8 ocean cruise operators and we will tell you the bits we like and the bits we don't like. The guide is unique to us 

​

​

​

 

 

CLIA

We belong to CLIA, a worldwide organisation that all the major cruise lines
and cruise agents belong. Formerly called PSARA, the retail arm of the Passenger Shipping Association, of which we were one of the original founding members

​

​

​

A statement from us regarding the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

The General Data Protection Regulation is effective 25 May 2018.  Under guidance from the Information Commissioners Office (ICO), we have to let you know how we comply with the regulation regarding your privacy and the information we hold.   Remember, in simple terms, you have control of the information you provide to us, so the following will be of help to you

​

For clients that book with us

When putting your cruise booking in place we need to have your full names, address and contact details, email address, dates of birth and passport information.  This is required by the cruise lines and airlines in order to process your booking.  At any time, you can request we delete any of this information and we will action this immediately.  We do not share any of your information with any other organisations not related to your booking

​

For clients on our mailing lists that have yet to book with us

We hold your name, address, and in some cases, if provided by you, your email address.  Again, we are happy to remove your information at any time, immediately.  Again, we do not share your information with any other organisations

​

Direct mail and Email marketing

Regularly throughout the year we will send you our newsletters and marketing material by post or email.  This is because you are on our mail list.  You are on our mail list because you would have contacted us following either seeing our press adverts, seeing our websites, or word of mouth.  We never contact anyone blindly, and we never buy mail lists or email lists.  Again, please ask to be removed if you no longer wish to hear from us